September 27, 2025

A Few Things to Tell You Vol. 2

on grieving and reading and gathering

Well hello there, thanks for being with me today ♡

To start, a huge thank you to everyone who sent such lovely messages this week ~ I read them all and treasure every single one of them so very very much ♡ Your words and time matter to me.

My head is still spinning a bit from the past week. Last Saturday, the youngest and I had a delightful day out shopping and doing errands and planning our jewelry-making for the Life of a Showgirl movie outing. We had just gotten home when I got the call about Oma. I had been texting with my siblings and nieces some silliness about kombucha, and was just about to go lie in bed and read for a bit when my aunt called and the whole tone and pace of the day instantly shifted.

I spent the rest of the afternoon texting and talking with family and friends, and then made plans to go down to be with my aunt and scrambled to make all the necessary arrangements for being out of town and missing work suddenly. Did I have to go? No. But I WANTED to go.

I am so grateful I had the opportunity to spend those days with other family members who needed to, and wanted to, actively grieve.

Everyone processes a death in different ways, but I have come to realize that I am healthiest in grief when I can DO something and be with others who are also wanting to talk and cry and laugh together.

Oma has seven children, sixteen grandchildren, and eighteen great-grandchildren. That’s a lot of theoretical people to help, but they are spread out over the entire country, and currently, the world. The group on-hand was much smaller.

Two of my aunts, a cousin, a niece and I spent such therapeutic time together cleaning out Oma’s room at her nursing home, talking / laughing/ crying, and then went out for lunch together and got to spend even more talking. We celebrated the fact that we ushered Oma out with a team of tough women loading her stuff into a big ass truck - NO MEN NEEDED HERE THANK YOU VERY MUCH.

I then spent the next day and a half at my aunt and uncle’s house helping with a lot of logistical things, writing the obituary, and helping care for my cousin’s 3-year-old who was staying with my aunt and uncle for a few weeks. As they thanked me over and over, I kept insisting that me being there was just as much for me as for them ~ I NEEDED to be helpful and be there to aid in my own closure. Writing the obituary with my aunt’s input was such an honor, and I loved doing the research and collaboration it involved.

I said over and over again that them accepting my offer of help was the greatest gift they could give me. Please remember that, my friends. When people sincerely offer to help, LET THEM.

Oma’s life was incredibly full and she, by all accounts, was loved and cherished right up to the very end. She was 90 years old, her body had stopped working, and it was time for her to be released from her physical pain and mental confusion. We are all so grateful that things progressed as quickly as they did so that this release came before the pain and confusion became even worse.

Oma’s death was expected and question- and guilt- free at a very old age. Final goodbyes were said and final visits made. Loved ones were with her. We are mourning only what was, and not what could have been. To be explicitly clear: this does not make our sadness over her finally being gone any less, but perhaps it does makes it cleaner. Our family has also been impacted by a much different kind of death, and how terribly horrible it is to be able to compare the two.

This exact comparison is what made me immediately gravitate toward a recent library check-out that I hadn’t been sure I would be able to handle due to its very very sad nature. I never know what I will want to read in any particular moment, but upon returning home I wanted to read about death and grieving, and why not level up to reading about what is arguably the very toughest and most brutal form of death and grieving: that of a mother for her child. And in this book’s case, TWO of her children by what is again, arguably, one of the toughest types of death to reconcile: suicide.

Things in Nature Merely Grow by Yiyun Li was exactly what I needed this week. She states plainly that if you’re not up for radical acceptance, if you’re not up for hearing her say the word “die” rather than “passed away”, not up for reading about suicide, this book is not for you.

This book WAS for me. I mean, I had just spent time counseling my aunt on how to tell her granddaughter that her beloved OmaOma was dead ~ no we can’t say “resting”, we need to use the word “died”, and yes, it’s okay to cry. I recommended this book, which they used, as it is specifically for this age group.

I have found that reading about death and dying and grief and the absolute worst that can happen is my way of building myself a toolbox for when it does, inevitably, happen. No, books never actually make anything better, but they help us realize we’re not alone and damn, just look at what so many others have endured. If they can do it, so can I.

Reading helps me make sense of the world, put things in order, feel less alone, understand what horrors I have yet to endure, and so much more. I am so grateful Li wrote this book ~ she gave the world a tremendous gift by sharing her trauma.

On Another Note

This week wasn’t JUST grieving and death, though, don’t worry ☺ We also celebrated the youngest’s 14th birthday AND my mom’s 67th birthday ~ they share a birthday! I had a pumpkin shake from Culver’s to celebrate - OMG it was amazing.

Joy amidst the pain, as is often the case.

On Friday I took the girls and the youngest’s friend for a birthday trip to Minneapolis to Birchbark Books and the Mall of America. The oldest is on her out to Colorado to spend a week with my mom. We’re making plans for the whole large family to gather next month for Oma’s celebration of life. Gathering fills my soul, and all of these things help remind me that being with PEOPLE truly is the center of my life, as much as my hermit tendencies try to take over.

I also read a much lighter book (thanks to Kellie Burke!) immediately after finishing Li’s memoir, and it was a perfect way to soothe my rattled soul.

A Rosie Life in Italy by Rosie Meleady is a travel and home renovation memoir that made me laugh out loud and dream of my own falling down villa in Italy … vs my own falling down farmhouse in Wisconsin - ha! I absolutely LOVE reading about people my age with long marriages, young adult children, and all the messiness that this life stage brings. It was such a cozy read.

And that’s it for this week!

Take care, dear readers. Call your people. Or at the very least, text a silly picture of Unity kombucha or something.

Thanks for stopping by!